TravellerMap.com - Why you should consider using the Traveller Universe setting for your Space RPGs.

[@EmptyKingdoms]

I just started fooling around with sci-fi RPGs after fantasy. And I found out about Traveller. Despite not grasping half the rules yet, it feels like one of the best games ever made. Seeing this website brings me to tears. So much worthy effort, so much to explore. May the gods bless you all.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Yeah the game is awesome. 40ish years of content and resources make it almost a literal universe to explore. Happy flying!

[@karlheilmann9172]

I'm sure you have learned a lot more about the game since posting this, but the basics make it pretty easy. That is, you just need to understand that all rolls are d6, 2d6 for skill challenge rolls and some other use of d6s for damage and random chart rolls. All challenges have a basic success of 8+ that you have to roll on the 2d6. That's pretty much all you need to start playing. Roll your character attributes (using 2d6), roll your background (using 2d6 and 1d6 in some cases), do some initial RP to start off how your characters know each other from their pasts and then you can even use the random charts to roll (2d6) for a patron who offers you a job and off you go on the adventure. Draw on any plot of any movie or book that challenges values and beliefs, threatens survival and offers a good payday! You can fill in the blanks of other rules as you learn and play. HAVE FUN! Remember, space is rather unforgiving!

[@InexorableTash]

Thanks for the great overview of my little site. You did a great job of giving a run-through of the features for players and referees. Hit me up (via contact links on the site) if you've got any questions.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thanks for the reply! I love the site!

[@c.s.oneill2079]

You are a legend. The Traveller map is one of the best things ever done for Traveller. I love exploring it. Thank you for your amazing work!

[@GryphonDes]

Agreed 100% on the Traveller map! You should also give the game a whirl it is a deep, expressive and enthralling as its universe - and very fun!

[@paperdicegames6585]

Oh I have - I adore Traveller! Thanks for the comment!

[@ardwulfslair]

Can't thumbs-up hard enought. It's an immense and unique resource.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Agreed!

[@danielmcgillis270]

As a Traveler, I love this map.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Me too! Great resource!!

[@LeonardHarris]

I've known about travelermap for a while, but had no idea the functionality. Thanks for the video.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Glad I could help!

[@HeadHunterSix]

I'm so glad you took the time to do this video - I hadn't known about some of the functionality such as planetary maps and full star system info. Even better, thanks!

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thanks for both comments! Yes, I frequently see this resource shared as one of the best Traveller tools out there (rightfully so) - but so many people miss some of the great tools included! I'm sure there's more, but these are the things I find most helpful!

[@PossumMedic]

You had me convinced 10 seconds in! 😂 I love rolling up my own stuff as much as the next guy but why reinvent the wheel?! 🤷‍♂ Great vid thanks! New sub! 🙌‍

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thank you for the kind words! Glad you liked the video!

[@mattknee7561]

This is fantastic! Glad to find your video on today's deep dive: it started with Hostile Solo, the Hostile system/setting, and then led to Traveller.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Glad you found it! I hope it was useful!

[@IthaquasBane]

Thank you for finding this!! I haven't played Traveller since the ancient times and the small black books, but I reckon I will be using this as a basis for my next "5 Parsecs From Home" campaign and any/all SciFi games I play and record later on!!

[@paperdicegames6585]

Glad to hear you can make use of this! Thanks for checking it out!

[@karlheilmann9172]

I use Roll20 along with this, as well. I make a journal for each planet and put ship library info for the Travellers in the player's section and then notes for me in the GM section. Then the players can hit the library of whatever planets I have made available for Players. It's a neat tool to simulate the ship's library, I think. I include information on available cargo, spaceship approach and departure lanes, flora and fauna and the UWP information, of course. I realize this is an old post I am replying to, but anyone reading it now may find the idea handy.

[@RichardBejtlich]

I had no idea this existed. What an amazing resource!

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thank you - glad I could help!

[@Radiotomb]

Thanks for this demo and tour!

[@paperdicegames6585]

My pleasure!

[@antytrend]

Well, well, well there’s not a whole universe to explore. It’s a fraction of a single galaxy. 😊 just fooling around great video. We use the map for a sandbox game. It works great and there is a veritable universe of information.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Haha true true! I agree its a spectacular resource for a sandbox game!

[@andrewburgess9578]

Been using for couple on months - world map generator and system plan or new to me. Brilliant thanks.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thanks for checking the video out, glad it helped!

[@HeadHunterSix]

Traveller Map is _super_ useful. And I _love_ the functionality to download PDF sector booklets like the old style supplements. The links to the Wiki are helpful as well. It may be the best and most useful web resource for any game I've ever played.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Yeah, I totally agree - I'm trying to target a space game for my group next year. Traveller or not, if we run in space, I'll be using TravellerMap.com!

[@arglebargle17]

After many months, I finally finished a novel that I set in the Traveller universe. The Traveller map proved invaluable to me to envision places for my characters to travel to, settings for events and so on. The one thing conspicuously absent from the Traveller map is there's no system that's a religious dictatorship. Something the rules allow for. I needed one for my story. Fortunately, there tons of balkanized systems. It was easy enough to put in a small religious dictatorship in one of those systems. It was also a great frustration to my protagonists dealing with a systems with 200+ legal systems rather than one.

[@paperdicegames6585]

That’s interesting - with such a big established universe, a missing type of government. No longer though, right? Your novel fixed that!

[@arglebargle17]

@@paperdicegames6585Technically, no. I just took a balkanized planet, one that the map said had 200+ governments, and simply assumed one of them was a Religious Dictatorship.

[@FaoladhTV]

It's also possible to put together custom sector data for use with the site and so use all of the same tools with a homebrew setting.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Yeah, great callout! Lots of those fields are editable!

[@tomdadada]

While lots of RPG´s talking about their specific "Universe" - the Traveller-one really deserves that label by its scope and diversity of information and mechanics

[@paperdicegames6585]

Yeah, its crazy how expansive the universe is. Even crazier is to consider that it’s not procedurally generated via computer (at least not to my knowledge)!

[@09lonedrone]

This is what I needed!

[@paperdicegames6585]

Awesome, glad it helped!

[@rossm7346]

Awesome!

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thanks!

[@abstractbybrian]

This is great. I forgotten about the world maps from t5 - I want to chk that out more

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thanks for checking it out!

[@briansmaller7443]

My Holowan Sector is there!

[@paperdicegames6585]

Did you design it?

[@davewilson13]

Great video. Can you show how to customize the map next?

[@paperdicegames6585]

I'll add it to the list - thanks for the suggestion!

[@badwolf7367]

Although I understand why Marc Miller designed the original mapping systems, there is a flaw that subsequent revisions have not corrected. The original format was used at a time when PC's were not readily available, so the amount of information had to be kept at a manageable level when players were using only paper and pencils. However, rather than representing a single main world/planet, the hex should represent a star system with information on star class, number of planetary objects, and whether there are anything in the interstellar medium such as nebula or uncommon stellar objects. One of the reasons why I think this is a better format is because given the level of technology in Traveller, it is more than likely there would be systems with more than one developed/settled world, not to mention permanent space stations or cities. And this would also be useable for systems without any planets which cannot be represented using the UPP/UWP format.

[@paperdicegames6585]

I get it too, and you do bring up some good points. I do think there is value in having a UWP for a system, while also understanding the limitations of the UWP. I also really enjoy how many systems are well developed. For example (and this is from memory so hopefully accurate), Beltstrike! Really expands the Bowman system, and brings it to life well beyond its UWP. But it still holds true to the general nature of the UWP. Anyway thanks for the comment!

[@karlheilmann9172]

I believe a big part of the thinking on this was and is that referees have enough to work with while giving them more to develop. A game that allows players/referees to make it their own draws a lot of people in (creative people), but defining systems to a degree allows you to play without needing to put all of that extra energy into it if you don't want to. I really have enjoyed that the map links us to the wiki, so we have the star(s) and main world information, as well as the map generator that give more information about the system (moons, etc) and links to flesh out each of those objects. Truthfully, once you get an example or two of how the world generator does it, a Ref could pretty easily just make all of that up (given some down time). Love this system and this game tool! I think where Mongoose took it is great, also!

[@beladan]

Once you generate the planet maps, you can click in the hexes and drill in to 100km 10km and then 1km ranges.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Great tip! Thanks for sharing!

[@valorin5762]

What always bothered me about Traveller's star maps, is the fact that they don't factor in the Z axis of the systems, which make a huge difference in distance. One hex equals about 1 parsec, means about 3.26 light years. Tau Ceti for example is about 12ly away from Earth. It is about 11ly _below_ Sol though on the galactic plane. Only looking at x and y coordinates Tau Ceti would seem about 3.5ly away. On a hex map that's about 1 hex (parsec), while the real distance would be roughly 4 hexes (parsecs) though. I mean, sure, it's simplified for ease of play, but one of the main things in space when it comes to positioning, is the fact that objects are not positioned on a flat plane, but the Z axis is a very important factor for space mapping. Milkyway's galactic plane is quite bumpy and some systems that appear sitting on each other looking on a flat map, are actually 20+ly apart, one being very high on the z axis, the other very low. There. Nerdy rant end. The effort, details and features put into the TravellerMap are actually very impressive though. I love a good map and I am actually a little sad that Traveller as a system comes with flat space maps, so I personally won't use it. :(

[@paperdicegames6585]

I completely agree, Z axis is super important in real life. I also agree that it was left off for ease of play (especially in a paper first system). Ignoring the Z axis also improves accessibility for less hardcore gamers in a system that can already seem intimidating…but yeah it would be cool to see if there was a solution that didn’t sacrifice too much on either complexity or accessibility.

[@valorin5762]

@@paperdicegames6585 For the Third Imperium that solution would have to be implemented back when the map was made I fear. Otherwise it's not very complex to do or intimidating to use in play. Sure, the bigger the map and the more you are travelling, the more it will come up. I'm too much of a space nerd though to be able to ignore it, I fear. A flat Milkyway just feels very wrong for me, and I'm glad that I'm playing Traveller in another setting with a much smaller map. But yes, of course it was made for ease of play, same as you can fire crossbows every turn in many fantasy RPGs, which I find abominable too, because you can't reload a medieval crossbow in 3 or even 6 seconds. But that's just me. :D

[@karlheilmann9172]

Yes, it's a bit Star Trek 2D, but a Ref can always add on layers, creating new systems by the dozens. Of course, this system also does not consider that all systems and objects in space are always moving relative to each other (though it touches on it with the level of difficulty mentioned about astrogation). At least it gets around the Theory of Relativity that FTL travel would present, that all of your loved ones will be dead when you return as you aged differently than them. With Jump, travel takes just over a week of "real time" and there isn't a difference in the passage of time. And by using space flight more similar to atmospheric flight, we avoid the troubles of figuring out all kinds of thrust vectors for dogfights and such. Overall, I think Traveller presents a very playable atmosphere that does have a certain level of suspension of disbelief.

[@rodneykelly8768]

The only problem with Traveller map is that you can't plumb a strait line. For example, if your adventure involves an object similar to Muamua. It's going the travel interstellarly, but it is not going to use jump drives. Unless the object travels along the hexes, you are going to need to use a printed map and some string the get its flight path.

[@rodneykelly8768]

For the record, Google maps has the same problem. You can't get a "As The Crow Flies" distance.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Yeah good point. Jump drives are a core mechanic of the game, and while you can do “line of sight” travel inside a system, it’s important to know that jumping from one system to the next is using Jump Drives.

[@666wurm]

Great map but it is missing a search funktion to locate a wanted UWP value set.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Yeah that would be a nice feature

[@paperdicegames6585]

Yeah that would be a great feature.

[@SSNewberry]

I am doing a "Long Night" in the Solomani Rim. The only thing I did was create more multi-world confederations.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Sounds like a fun idea!

[@SSNewberry]

@@paperdicegames6585 It is working so far. Miller is one of the geniuses of game design.

[@dane3038]

But can you customize it? Not much practical use to most GMs if we can't get their Home-brew stuff in it. Neat though.

[@paperdicegames6585]

Not that I am aware of. But I like playing within the established universe

[@karlheilmann9172]

No, the Ref would have to make his own if he wants it customized. I customize things by using Roll20 or even 3 x 5 cards for my own content.

[@geeksurge]

Has anyone done a 3D Traveller map? I can't stomach a 2D map of the galaxy

[@paperdicegames6585]

I haven’t found one yet - and I get the tendency to want a 3d map. I think for many gamers 2d is a lot more approachable.

[@geeksurge]

@@paperdicegames6585 I think as a gamer who is comfortable with a high degree of complexity, I end having to make my own content much of the time.

[@karlheilmann9172]

I made my own using graph paper back in the mid-80s. I'm not sure I have it anymore, but I'm not a software guy, so I wouldn't convert it to digital in any case.

[@Kindertautenleider]

I am on a traveller youtube binge. I found this video by searching (traveller rpg astronomy). I was curious how much of our understanding of modern astronomy applies. I was planning a game centered around a very radioactive unstable red dwarf that is a ticking time bomb to explode and the team is racing against time to get the engines back online. anyway...thanks for the video

[@paperdicegames6585]

Thanks for sharing and for the kind words!